Selected quad for the lemma: word_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
word_n	holy_a	person_n	trinity_n	4,594	5	9.7992	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A40652	The best name on earth together with severall other sermons / lately preached at St. Brides and in other places by T. Fuller.	Fuller, Thomas, 1608-1661.	1659 (1659)	Wing F2413; ESTC R28667	34,017	156

to nothing yea we may generally observe that all cities that wear the sirname of Great are beheld by God with a jealous eye partly because greatnesse is a flower of the Crown of heaven partly because great cities presume on their populousnesse to be great sinners hoping in vain that their greatnesse will procure them an Act of Indemnity and God be moved to let them alone rather then to punish so many enough to make the sword of his Justice turn edge before it can cut through them 11. The premises I say have moved the great God of heaven to hold a strict eye and heavy hand over all cities sirnamed Great whilest lesser places Zoars escape best in general judgements Nineveh the great Jonah 3.3 Hamath the great Rabbah the great Babylon the great Revel 18.2 No the infinite Nahum 3.9 And Antioch by humane writers called Antiochia magna are all reduced to ruines 12. Give me leave to say to this citie of London as Darius did to Daniel in a holy complement O Darius live for ever that is understand it a finite ever might he in life health and prosperity continue to the utmost possibility of nature So say I O London last for ever may it flourish as long as any place hath a subsistence in this sublunary world however let it not be high minded but fear seeing Antioch a place as plentifull as puissant as populous is now dwingled away to an inconsiderable village 13. Come we now to the name of Christians This will bear a double debate first whether it was imposed by the enemies of the Church in scorn and derision or whether the Church it self did assume it as an act of their own election and approbation 14. I conceive the first utterly improbable for had the persecutours of the Church the depravers of goodnesse and good men given a name unto them they would have invented and imposed one more defamatory of greater shame and disgrace as to call them Hereticks Nazarites Crucifictians and the like and not so noble a name as Christians By the way we may observe that the word Christian is used twice in the Bible or if you will but once and an half Once 1 Pet. 4.16 Yet if any man suffer as a Christian let him not be ashamed but let him glorifie God on this behalf The half time Acts 26.28 when Agrippa said Thou hast perswaded me almost to be a Christian. In both which places we find the word taken in an honourable acception nothing of shame being imported therein which perswades us to believe the name was never fastened on Gods servants by their professed enemies A second enquiry succeeds viz. 15. Whether this name was by divine injunction immediately bestowed upon them or whether the Church meeting together by a prudentiall Act with a joint consent assumed it upon themselves I confesse at the first reading I conceived the text in the Original favoured the former where I read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes containeth divine inspiration therein and is so used Matth. 2.12 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And being warned of God in a dream This I say inclined me to believe the name of Christians to be revealed from God and by him immediately imposed on the disciples 16. But on second thoughts I find the word sometimes to import no more then a plain denomination And so it is used Rom. 7.3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 she shall be called an adulteresse which moveth me to believe that without any such immediate revelation from heaven in an extraordinary manner in the manifestation of Gods will the Apostles there present by the assistance of Gods spirit within them and the generall consent of the Church about them assumed that name upon themselves 17. Possibly because many believed some of the Circumcision and some of the Uncircumcision and because Gentiles was a name odious to the Iews and Iews offensive to the Gentiles therefore the word Christians was pitcht upon as common to both to bury the former names under it for though Iew and Gentile did ever remain as words of civil distinction they were henceforward abolished as terms of hatefull disparity Quest. 18. But why were they not called Fatherians from God the Father or holy Ghostians from the holy Ghost why onely Christians from Christ the second person in the Trinity here if any return that they are too harsh and ill sounding too troublesome and tedious to be pronounced the answer is in no degree satisfactory to the question For first were our tongues as long accustomed to the pronunciation of these words as they have been used to the word Christian a very lisping utterance would easily be able to expresse them Secondly we in England within these last fifteen yeares have acquainted our tongues with as hard terms with as numerous syllables some of Latine others of Greek extraction Presbyterians Antinomians Independents Representatives c. and yet these go down glib with us in our common discourse Answ. 19. The true answer is this we are called Christians from that person in the Trinity that hath merited most in the redemption of mankind 20. And here farre be it from me to make odious comparisons betwixt the persons in the Trinity and their deserts towards us which have most indeared us unto them That person who hath done least for us hath done more for us then we can requite then we can deserve then we can expresse then we can conceive however may dust and ashes in all humility confesse this most necessary and comfortable truth that Christ the second person in the Trinity is the best friend we have in the Court of Heaven and hath both done and suffered most in the effecting our salvation 21. Thence is that expression of David Psalme 110.1 The Lord said unto my Lord sit thou at my right hand untill I make thy enemies thy footstool The Lord that is God the Father said to my Lord that is to God the Sonne to Iesus Christ indeed one can take but little comfort in the Lord if not for my Lords intercession The Lord considered in his greatnesse and justice is our enraged enemy affording us cause of fear and sadnesse till beheld as reconciled in our Lord unto us 22. Now it will plainly appear that Christ hath performed most for mankind in order to our Salvation For first in operibus ad extra in all outward actions Christ the second person in Trinity hath an equall share with the other two Thus Christ as well as the other two persons in Trinity created the World and all therein John 1.1 2 3. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God The same was in the beginning with God All things were made by him and without him was not any thing made that was made 23. Secondly we are justified by Christ as well as by God the Father Gal. 2.17 But if while we seek to be justified

and severally sends them to the jury of the tribes of Israel Hard hearted husband if the least pity be alive in thy breast offer not this wrong unto the dead Is it not enough that her soul is parted from her body but her body also must be twelve times parted from it self suffer her ashes to sleep in quiet the pawn for the return of her soul methinks that knife that cuts her hands should pierce thine heart but comdemn not the Levite for this deed it was not cruelty but pitty and piety that moved him unto it that the sight of the corps might make the Jewes the more throughly prosecute the cause and every tribe that had a part of her body might have a part in revenging her innocent bloud Her mouth onely spake whilst she was living now each peice of her mangled corps speaks when shee is dead whilest the Israelites both attentively heard and judiciously understood the language thereof which made them condemn the causers of her death for matchlesse offendors many men have done villanously but these surmounted them all there was no such deed done nor seen since c. I will not mangle my text as the Levite his wife with often dividing it let it suffice to observe therein two principall parts First a narrration of a notorious villany there was no c. 2 The prescribing of wholesome orders for the future consult consider and give c. In the first two commendable practises of the Iewes commend themseIves to our meditation 1 First they were well skilled well versed in the severall actions which were done in their country before their time and used to match compare one deed with another to see which was better which worse which more which lesse vitious and amongst the army of sinnes behold this in my text stands like a Saul stands higher then his fellows by the shoulders upwards Herein let us follow the example of the Israelites let us read histories that we be not made an history let us compare the passages of the time past with those of the present age for as it is a great blemish in a Gentleman though never so proper and personable if he hath but such a crick in his neck that he cannot turn his face backward to see what is behind him so it is a great shame in such a one as pretends to learning and wisedome if by the benefit of wisedome he cannot reflect the eyes of his mind backward and see those things which were done in the dayes of his fathers and in the old time before them You therefore that have the chronicle of our kings in your houses the Acts and monuments in your halls condemn them not to a desk as the Jews did their harps to the willows rather for sight then service till moths have fretted out the bookes as worms have eaten the bodies of those worthy men who compiled them but at your best leisure read and peruse them But when you have read all humane Authors over they will be but so many muddy and brackish channells to the pure and fresh fountain of Gods holy word meditate therefore in the same both day and night wherein alone you shall find stories more true more various more pleasant more profitable then all other writers ancient or modern are able to afford 2. The second praise-worthy practise in the Israelites is this they kept the solemn and constant memorial of their coming out of the land of Egypt from which as from a memorable aera and remarkable Epoche they used to date and compute their severall actions not since the day that the children of Israel came out of the land of Egypt And good reason they had to remember it God then bestowing on their fathers a great deliverance who whilest they lived in Egypt lived in continuall slavery Indeed they had meat enough which may serve to condemn the cruelty of some masters to their servants now adayes who though they give them their bellyfull of work will not give them their bellyfull of victualls The Egyptians dealt better with the Jewes in this kind of onions cucumbers and the flesh-pots of Egypt they had their full by their own confession Yet their life being a bondage must needs be miserable liberty being the very life of our life without which our life is a continuall dying Yea the coming of the children of Israel out of Egypt may in some sort seem to them to have been the creation of the world Adam was made of the dust of the earth they then fetcht from the clay of the earth whereof they had made many hard bricks though not half so hard as the hearts of those Taskmasters which were set over them the world was made of nothing the Jewes when they came out of Egypt being made formerly for outward respects no better then nothing And as their remaining there was miserable so their removing thence was miraculous wonderfully therefore should they have forgot themselves if they had forgot Gods wonders towards them in this deliverance And have not wee English men as many and remarkable deliverances as ever the Jewes had some common with us to all Christans as the second birth day of the world at the birth of our Saviour You therefore that are clarks and notaries who in dating of acts and instruments with your posting pens make such frequent mention of the year of the Lord labour that those words which have been so often written with your hands may once be written in your hearts with the benefits accrued to all mankind by the birth of our Saviour Some proper to this our nation alone as the deliverance from the Spanish invasion in 88. Naomi said to the men of Bethlehem Ruth 1. call me not Naomi fair but call me mara bitter for the Lord hath afflicted me I went out full but return empty c. so might that great fleet say call me not the invincible Armado but call me the conquered Armado for the Lord hath punished my pride I went out full the terrour of the world but return empty to the scorn of all nations Go then you Spaniards bragge of Lisbon Bilboa and Toledo blades sure I am that then an English sword managed by the arm of the God of heaven was proved to be the best mettall Nor lesse miraculously from home-bred conspiracy in the gunpowder treason where the reason onely was intention but nothing thanks be to God brought to execution but the traytors Well it s said that things written in marble are most durable in difference of time I would not wish to us a marble hard or stony heart but such a one as is soft tender and pliable and surely this will sooner receive and longest retain the print of Gods favours unto us and principally of these deliverances wherein the people of England may be said to have come out of the land of Egypt Now that this sinne in my text may appear in its proper colours consider